"We're focused on doing one thing incredibly well. If you look at other companies, all of these companies are doing a lot of different things but we're still, as we grow, doing exactly one thing," she said.

"If that doesn't prove that [Facebook's] developers aren't thinking about security, I don't know what would."

-- An observer posting on Hacker News after Zuckerberg's personal photos were publicly revealed when a security flaw was exploited. Either Zuckerberg doesn't post his best photos at Facebook or the guy lives an incredibly boring life, playing with his dog and eating too much fried food.

Benioff vs. Ellison, Part 1

"Beware of the false cloud."

-- Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff in one of many tweets after Oracle dared to move a Benioff speech at OracleWorld. Benioff claimed his speech had been canceled, and given that he'd just publicly jabbed Oracle and CEO Larry Ellison, that claim could be viewed as justified. But Benioff, as he tends to do, went on too long about it.

Benioff vs. Ellison, Part 2

"That is such good advice, I could not have said it better myself."

-- Ellison, in an Oct. 6 speech at OracleWorld, where he also called Salesforce.com's flagship product "the roach motel" of the cloud. "You can check in, but you can't check out ... now that is a false cloud."

IT psychology 101

"I don't mean to be Dr. Phil here, but to get out of a contract you need to be ready to leave."

"You can never say all the tricks have been done. Someone always shows you something you didn't know. Every year you think, 'Gee, I didn't think you could do that.'"

-- Landon Curt Noll, a founder of the International Obfuscated C Code Contest, upon the return of the competition, in an interview in which he did not define what makes for obfuscated code. "It's like porn," he said. "You know it when you see it."

'They all suck'

"What we've actually been asked to do by Larry and Sergey is to investigate what technology alternatives exist to Java for Android and Chrome ... We've been over a hundred of these and think they all suck. We conclude that we need to negotiate a license for Java."

-- Google engineer Tim Lindholm in an August 2010 email that came to play a central role in Oracle's lawsuit alleging that the Android OS violates Java patents Oracle acquired with Sun Microsystems.

"That's a pretty good document for you. That ought to be big for you at trial."

-- In an incendiary interview after Yahoo fired her, Carol Bartz told Fortune magazine that is what she said to Yahoo Chairman Roy Bostock when she called him six minutes later than scheduled and he launched into a prepared legal statement dismissing her (though not because she failed to call on time). "I said, 'Roy, I think that's a script ... Why don't you have the balls to tell me yourself?'" she also recalled in the Fortune interview, during which she referred to the board as "doofuses." They "f---ed me over," she said of the board.

Another Sony breach

"Well, you guys were idiots for making it happen. At the same time, I hope it never happens to me."

"This is a completely different situation from the modest Internet manipulation that took place in Tunisia, where specific routes were blocked, or Iran, where the Internet stayed up in a rate-limited form designed to make Internet connectivity painfully slow. The Egyptian government's actions tonight have essentially wiped their country from the global map."

"The device many of us carry in our pockets has, simply put, been turned into a virtual spy phone."

-- John Simpson, Consumer Watchdog's Privacy Project director, said in an email the day his organization called for the U.S. government to investigate Carrier IQ, maker of tracking software for mobile phones.

No uncertain terms

"The record clearly shows that -- in no uncertain terms -- this merger would result in a massive loss of U.S. jobs and investment."

-- An official with the U.S. Federal Communications Commission the day the FCC declared AT&T's planned acquisition of T-Mobile USA not in the public interest.

Ballmer hopes

"We've gone from very small to very small but it's been a heck of a year. You're going to see a lot of progress in that market."

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